Mower County transcript. [volume] (Lansing, Minn.) 1868-1915, 1887-11-23
EDUCATIONAL.
G. d. BELDEN, EDITOR.
Such Reading !
(SELECTED.;

Such Heading! #5MT
(sELECTED.; IT
As the teacher is taught, so he teaches.
he was taught his b straight through
to & (and so forth) and then to spell b-a,
ba; hi, hi; BIO, DO; etc. Unless he was q
bright pupil, he did not get to & till the
end of his first term. His second term
was occupied in learning to spell words
of two and three letters. i
He thumbed through his readers, pain
fully spelling out his words, and, for
years, could see word only through it's
several individual letters.
He drawled through a paragraph, or
else sailed through at lightning speed
never once thinking there was any idea
to be expressed. and always supposing
that the one who could call words the
loudest or the fastest was the best reader.
Many of our younger teachers were not
so taught, but the picture is to many not
a bit overdlawn. The spirit of improve
ment, in its onward march, has struck the
pedagogue gently, and we rarely find a
teacher who does reading quite so poorly
as we have pictured. He, however, neg.
lects to develop thought from this sub
ject; he permits loud, unnatural tones; he
does not once think that 1t is necessary to
interest the pupil; he does not remember
that lesson that the pupil has read or
heard read over and again, is as void of
interest to him as is the daily or weekly
newspaper to the man who has once read
it; in short, he forgets that reading is a
means, not an end, and that in our day
much the larger part of our information
IS obtained from the printed page. In
assigning lesson. he says: "Take the
next lesson" leaving the pupil with as
little knowledge of what he is expected
to do, in preparing his lesson, as has the
teacher himself. In the recitation of the
lesson. the pupil at the head is called
upon to begin the lesson. When the para
graph is ended the teacher calls for cor.
rections. These consist of errors in
punctuation and wrong use of infections;
usually the next pupil is called, and thus
the time passes and the next lesson is as:
signed. Perhaps you do not conduct
reading IN this way, kind reader; but
don't you know those who do?
In no study. except language work
(and it Is so Intimately connected with
reading that the two arc inseparable). do
we teach so poorly. Our institutes need
to lay more stress upon primary reading.
Our examinations of applicants for certifi-
Gates to teach should give more credit for
properly assigning given reading lesson
and conducting the recitation of it, than
for mere correct oral reading on the part
of the applicant. With the county super
lntendent, by means of the institute and
the examinations, lies the power to I'M
prove this bad state of affairs. Every
teacher at the institute should give atten-
ton, first of all, to the instruction i'm
parted on the subject Of primary reading.
He should consider nothing else as being
of paramount Importance.
Don't Crowd the Programme.
If there is one thing against which I
feel like putting strong protest, it is the
crowded programme intended to pass
over a countless host of exercises, to
cripple up lessons to become crows
to the children when they pass over the
book for the second time. Such butcher
ing of lessons does more injury than
good; and if there IS any truth in the say.
ing. that our schools do not train pupils
enough in thinking. there can be no bct-
ter reason assigned for 1T than the cram.
ming. stuff1ng and pounding process that
too full programme requires. =
The programme should have aperiod
for miscellaneous topics, in which the
teacher may inform his pupils Of the cur
rent events of the day, render instruction
by means of educational papers, and read
articles to his pupils that will be food for
the liberty-loving. the patriotic, the loyal,
the moral, the true, the noble, the good.
The programme should be explained to
the pupils, by the teacher. For while a.
programme written on the blackboard,
and erased in few days may, perhaps,
not be the proper thing, yet, if it IS a pro.
gramme worthy of the name, and is
properly explained to the pupils. it does
more good by great deal, than the dried
up skeleton of recitatlons that lies in the
teachers desk whole winter undisturbed,
awaiting its resurrection at the approach
of the county superintendent r.
Mohr, IN National Educator. .ss